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Lee Stansfield

In June 2001 my ex-partner and I went for a walk around the headland on the spectacularly picturesque south western tip of the Lleyn Peninsula near Mynydd Mawr, North West Wales. It was a beautiful day with blazing sunshine, few people about, choughs circling the cliffs and playing amongst the remains of the buildings which once housed pilgrims on their way to and from Bardsey - Ynys Enlli - which was clearly visible across the water. The sea was not exactly wild, but choppy enough to splash the rocks with some force occasionally sending spray a metre or so into the air.

http://www.forteantimes.com/happened/hummm.shtml

Link is dead. See post below for complete text.
 
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I was at Kilve beach the other day, on the north somerset coast. It's a really interesting place: the sedimentary cliffs are twisted up and down, and the shore is a sequence of sloping 'pavements' (they look just like they were laid deliberately) separated by weedy muddy areas, going down to the sea. We walked along the shore to get away from the throngs of screaming children that were congregated around the access point down the cliffs. Eventually we'd got away from everyone, and sat down say 10 m from the cliff. My other half nipped into the next curve of the cliffs to answer a call of nature and I was left entirely alone. I became aware of a faint buzzing noise, like a swarm of bees. Now the point is, perhaps it was insects, because it was a gorgeously hot day. I'm sure I've heard that the 'hummadruz' is generally heard in the summer? Though perhaps somebody can prove me wrong. But I couldn't see any insects and I couldn't really work out where the noise was coming from. I wondered whether it was some kind of acoustic thing going on with the distant sea and the cliffs (I can't remember being able to hear the sea). I thought of the hummadruz at the time but I felt very reluctant to put it down as that as the noise wasn't particularly loud, and I kicked against the idea that I'd experience it, being interested in Forteana etc. I suppose it was a kind of white noise. I didn't mention it to my boyfriend on his return.
 
Passing Submarines (Ouch!)

The rock you were against may have been resonating to the vibrations of a passing submarine's newfangled sonar. It kills ceteceans, so making rocks hum would be a cinch.
 
Maybe, but...

Wouldn't see this as a part of Wales where you'd find submarines.

Besides, cetacean slaughtering sonar? I'm intruiged. More please...
 
Bless the U.S. Navy

It has a new radar system that has proven fatal to marine life, but that is considered so all-fired vital that they are going ahead with it anyway. That it kills ceteceans and fish is about as important as civilian casualties in Afghanistan, y'know?
 
My mother told me an interesting story today-she and my father were visiting a stone circle in West Penwith (the end of Cornwall-I think I have spelled it right!) , after checking it out they walked up higher and sat on a large flat rock to look at the circle-suddenly the whole rock started to vibrate! Like a sort of buzz.They looked at each other and suddenly had the strong urge to leave,she said she had the distinct impression something was about to happen and she didn't want to be there when it did! This was in the middle of the afternoon and occurred sometime in the mid 60s.
 
Be Interesting

Be interesting to see if there were any ELF transmitters near there, or if there was a passing submarine off shore, etc. I'm thinking of ELF resonance, of course.
 
What's a hummadruz? And is a chough a bird?
 
The link in post #1 is long dead. Here's the complete text, salvaged from the Wayback Machine ...

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HUMMM

Lee Stansfield


In June 2001 my ex-partner and I went for a walk around the headland on the spectacularly picturesque south western tip of the Lleyn Peninsula near Mynydd Mawr, North West Wales. It was a beautiful day with blazing sunshine, few people about, choughs circling the cliffs and playing amongst the remains of the buildings which once housed pilgrims on their way to and from Bardsey - Ynys Enlli - which was clearly visible across the water. The sea was not exactly wild, but choppy enough to splash the rocks with some force occasionally sending spray a metre or so into the air.

A short scramble down a creek and over some rocks to the sea brings you to St Mary's Well, a freshwater spring adjacent to the spot where the pilgrims boarded their boats to set off across Bardsey Sound. We had been here a couple of times before and the spot instils a sense of awe; with the waves crashing against the rocks you wonder how easy it was for the sick and the lame to get aboard the little boats which must have transported them over to the island on their journey of faith.

As we sat on the rocks next to the well watching the sea we suddenly became aware of a low humming noise. Dismissing it as a passing aircraft we at first ignored it but then as it seemed to become a constant throb we became curious. We climbed out of the creek where the spring was and scanned the skies for a plane or helicopter, but there was none to be seen. The higher we climbed, the less audible the sound became, until out of the creek and away from the rocks it disappeared altogether.

Deciding it was perhaps a boat near here we were sat we walked to the cliff top and searched for a craft below of any description which could have been generating such a noise from its engine. The only boat we could see was a small yacht to the east of Ynys Enlli in full sail. The distance and the type of boat this was, ruled that out as an option. Climbing back down the rocks to the well, we remarked once again how the sound increased. Indeed, one could even sense that it was eminating from the rock itself! The strange thing was, when I placed my ear against the rock the sound became neither louder nor quieter, just remained at a constant volume.

After about fifteen minutes of constant humming, the noise stopped, suddenly, leaving me and my partner to wonder what it was. Some kind of gentle seismic activity? Vibration caused by the sea against the rocks? Maybe it was a small boat that we hadn't seen. Or maybe it was the legendary "Hummadruzz"? Whatever it was kept both of us wondering for a long time afterwards...

Anybody else had a similar experience in this part of Wales?

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SALVAGED FROM: https://web.archive.org/web/20021029122536/http://www.forteantimes.com:80/happened/hummm.shtml
 
What's a hummadruz? And is a chough a bird?

Probably tygerkat is no longer browsing but for others that might wonder, Choughs are Corvid birds, i.e. related to crows, that have bright red legs and beaks locally common in parts of Wales.
 
I think water can make noises travel strangely. I was working in a street well known to me last week during Storm Ali and I could hear the planes from Glasgow Airport (on the other side of the River Clyde) REALLY loud. I could actually feel my trousers vibrating at one point!
The airport is a fair distance away from Clydebank, and I work a lot here (and live nearby) so know the local sounds well. Never heard anything like that before and I can only put it down to the storm and the river somehow working to magnify it.

I also used to hear the Hum a LOT - again, probably connected to our proximity to the Clyde although it really did sound electrical to me.
 
A moment ago, I heard a humming/buzzing noise. I said 'What was THAT!' and Techy said oh yeah, that was on TV.
We wound it back and he was right, someone pushed a chair back from a table and it made a scraping sound on the wooden floor.

So no mystery, dammit.
 
I was watching TV one night , I lived on a farm in the arse end of nowhere surrounded by sheep fields . I had the volume fairly low as the farmer was a miserable sod , and as I watched I was aware of a persistent humming noise. As my TV wasn't exactly new I thought , is that the tubes making that hum so I dared to turn the volume up a bit but still the hum. So I turned it off and I could still hear it and my front door was open for the cats and as I said I was in the middle of nowhere so I often had it open , especially in the summer. I got up and went to the door and I could hear it louder ,in the field adjacent to my door albeit with trees blocking my view and it seemed to be coming from that field and it wasn't electric fences because they were over the other side of the farm and barely made any noise especially from 100 yards away over yonder. The humming kept going rather loudly and I was more than a little freaked out so I made sure my cats were in then shut and bolted the door and ran upstairs like a scaredycat !!
 
I was watching TV one night , I lived on a farm in the arse end of nowhere surrounded by sheep fields . I had the volume fairly low as the farmer was a miserable sod , and as I watched I was aware of a persistent humming noise. As my TV wasn't exactly new I thought , is that the tubes making that hum so I dared to turn the volume up a bit but still the hum. So I turned it off and I could still hear it and my front door was open for the cats and as I said I was in the middle of nowhere so I often had it open , especially in the summer. I got up and went to the door and I could hear it louder ,in the field adjacent to my door albeit with trees blocking my view and it seemed to be coming from that field and it wasn't electric fences because they were over the other side of the farm and barely made any noise especially from 100 yards away over yonder. The humming kept going rather loudly and I was more than a little freaked out so I made sure my cats were in then shut and bolted the door and ran upstairs like a scaredycat !!

Was it July/August ish? And were there some crop fields around? If so it may have been a combine harvester at night - around here (south west England) if we get some good dry weather in later summer one can hear the machine humming/droning late into the night and the noise carries from up to a mile away if the air is still or a breeze in the right direction. It's distinctive!

 
Well it's a possibility , pity I was too chickenshit to peer beyond the trees (AHH, I knew I'd get a Rush reference in sooner or later !!) THOUGH that was in Bradley , a stone's throw from Oulton that purportedly had UFO activity
 
Well it's a possibility , pity I was too chickenshit to peer beyond the trees (AHH, I knew I'd get a Rush reference in sooner or later !!) THOUGH that was in Bradley , a stone's throw from Oulton that purportedly had UFO activity
Sorry I really must read replies properly. Yes it kind of was electrical sounding , humming and almost throbbing through you (oo-er !!)
 
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